13 Top Articles From The Indiahikes Archives

Yesterday, I found an old article from our website, and it put a smile on my face. One of our trekkers had written about the “Toughest Part of a Trek” (and its not the trek itself.) It was quite a humorous article. And it was written nearly a decade ago, when Indiahikes had just started.

Reading that article made me dive into our archives. And I tell you, I found a whole treasure box there!

There are 896 articles published on our website, and the number has been building up since 2010. Back then, it was mostly our founders and people they knew who wrote articles. They have written about their thoughts, opinions, trekking tips.

What pleasantly surprised me was that Indiahikes still retains the same ideals as it did 10 years ago. Our basic thoughts about the trekking world have not strayed. Our values have only been strengthened over time.

So today I’ll share some articles from our archives. I think each of them is worth your time because you’ll learn something about our world of trekking. A lot of these articles have also shaped the future of many trekking trails, some of which you might have been on. Some articles are highly read on the website. Some are simply pleasant reads!

Let’s dive right into it. Just click on the titles to read the articles. I have added links to some interesting related articles as well.

This article went on to become a legacy. Our founder, Arjun Majumdar, put it down after his first time on the Rupin Pass trail. It is after his thoughts that everyone now talks about “surprises” on the Rupin Pass trek.

Prashanth UC, our co-founder Sandhya’s brother, writes down what the toughest part of a trek is (and it’s not the trek itself!) I love his amused tone in this article. It’s hard to find such simple humour these days.

Six trekkers who were part of the Kashmir Great Lakes exploration share their thoughts after the trek — this article is totally unedited. It’s their thoughts as they sent them. There’s also a small account here of the route that the exploratory team proposed to take and an alternate trek they were planning to explore. If you want to know what has turned the Kashmir Great Lakes trek the legendary trek it is today, you’ll find the initial thoughts here. Watch history unfold.

This was written by our co-founder, Sandhya UC, at a time when there were just a few hundreds of people trekking in our country. There was a myth hanging in the air that trekking was only for the “sporty” and “outdoorsy” folk. That has changed over time, especially with us starting easier treks for beginners. But this article stands good even today — a lot goes into deciding the difficulty level of a trek.

When we started taking trekkers to the mountains, our founders believed it was incredibly important to keep them informed about every aspect of it. So our founder put down this article on how Diamox works. I still believe it is one of the simplest, easiest-to-understand explanations of this topic! We have gone on to write a lot more about high altitude and the human body. You’ll find our articles here.

Still one of the most popular articles on our website, our founder wrote this in 2011 when he saw too many inexperienced trekkers going on the Stok Kangri trek. For many, Stok Kangri was about chasing altitudes. Unfortunately, this “altitude sickness” still remains today. We hope we see a stronger spirit of exploration in trekkers rather than “altitude sickness.”

Our thoughts have never strayed from the time our co-founder Sandhya wrote this. Back then, it was just this article on our website recognising good qualities of trekkers. These days, however, we hand a Spirit Of Trekking Award to our good trekkers! You could read about some of them here. We also believe that there’s a certain way of trekking, even as a team. Read about what we believe is the ideal trek team here.

Izzat Ansari, who then headed the Green Trails efforts at Indiahikes, writes a personal account of the first Green Trails project at Roopkund in 2013. What was just a week-long project then is now a full-fledged department at Indiahikes, with a massive team working across all our slopes!

An account of one of our first HAPE rescues, led by two of our ex Trek Leaders Saranbir and SJ. Our content team then interviewed the trekker and Trek Leaders and wrote this down. Today, we have had more altitude sickness-related rescues than we can count, including of non-Indiahikes trekkers too!

One of our dear friends, Sathya Venakatachari, wrote this article. He has forever contested the idea of organised trekking. Unfortunately, he is not with us today. He went on a trek last year and no one has heard from his since. In his article, he debates on whether a solo, unguided trek is better than an organised trek. This is our tribute to Sathya.

Our founder, Arjun Majumdar, jots down an account of how small enterprises run by locals started sprouting in the mountains once trekking began to grow. It’s fascinating to see how such micro enterprises have boomed in the mountains today! We see how people who worked as cooks and porters back then, now own cars, hotels and run businesses, further employing mountain people — all of this just thanks to trekking! It’s incredible!

An article put together by our founder back in 2013. Even back then we believed that children should trek. It’s sends our hearts soaring now that we see children taking to trekking. And we are glad to be able to run treks solely for children and families! 🙂

A never ending debate within our office on which is a more rewarding trek. I know it’s a little moot, considering Roopkund is still out of reach. But it’s worth a read simply for the love of both the treks.

There are lot more articles in our archives. But I think I’ll stop here.

Swathi Chatrapathy is the Chief Editor at Indiahikes. She also runs a video series, Trek With Swathi. Before joining Indiahikes, she worked as a reporter and sub-editor at Deccan Chronicle. She holds a Masters in Digital Journalism and continues to contribute to publications such as Deccan Herald. Trekking, to her, is a sport that liberates that mind like nothing else can.Read Swathi's other articles. Watch Swathi's video series here.

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Swathi Chatrapathy is the Chief Editor at Indiahikes. She also runs a video series, Trek With Swathi. Before joining Indiahikes, she worked as a reporter and sub-editor at Deccan Chronicle. She holds a Masters in Digital Journalism and continues to contribute to publications such as Deccan Herald. Trekking, to her, is a sport that liberates that mind like nothing else can.